On 5th January, 1937, Mona Tinsley, aged ten, left her school in Newark and vanished. Later a man called Nodder, who lived at Retford and who had stayed at the Tinsleys once as a lodger, was charged with taking her away by fraud, convicted, and sentenced at Birmingham Assizes to seven years' penal servitude by Mr. Justice Swift.

The police continued in their constant search for the body which they knew, but could not prove, had been hidden somewhere by Nodder in the vicinity. Eventually the child was found in a canal, and on 22nd November, 1937, Nodder appeared at Nottingham Assizes charged with her murder.

He was found guilty, and duly executed. Readers will find much interest in the passages in the first trial between the judge and counsel for the defence, who had much to put up with from the judge's wit.